ITEMS NEEDED  |  PERMISSIONS  |  STYLE  |  ARTWORK  |  MARKETING
ROYALTIES  |  ORDERING BOOKS  |  SERVICES PROVIDED  |  FORMS

SUBMITTING A MANUSCRIPT

ITEMS NEEDED

• Completed manuscript as a Word document
• Author information form & photo (professionally taken head & shoulders shot)
• Permission request forms (if necessary)
• Interview release forms (if necessary)
• Contributor's agreement form (if necessary)
  

***All components of the manuscript must be submitted at the same time as the text, including permissions, photographs, captions, figures and other illustrative material. We will not begin on your book until we have everything we need.

PERMISSIONS

It is the responsibility of the author for securing all permissions to reprint all material owned by others, textual and visual, including your own previously published work to which you do not hold the copyright.

Text

• Chapters or sections written by individuals other than the author
• Epigraphs (quotations on chapter openings or following subheadings)
• Government reports and documents (Note: federal government materials are public domain but may contain material copyrighted by others; state government documents require permission unless otherwise specifically indicated.)
• Interviews (use of portions of published interviews may be fair use)
• Letters and emails (correspondence created by author does not need permission)
• Poetry
• Prose text (original or revised) from an author's previously published works
• Scholarly apparatus, such as filmographies or discographies, created by someone other than the author (if previously published, use of these materials may be fair use, but credit should be given to creator)
• Song lyrics (fair use does not apply)
• Translations by others of copyrighted material
• Unpublished works (fair use does not apply)

Images

• Advertisements
• Cartoons
• Drawings or line art
• Film stills and video captures (considered fair use if used inside the book)
• Photos taken by people other than the author, including stock photo images, as well as images of fine arts objects, magazine or book covers, author photo, etc.
• Reproductions of original works of visual art

Other Materials

• Jacket/cover art
• Maps (no permission is needed if created for author's current book by paid mapmaker)
• Musical notation, as from sheet music (fair use does not apply)
• Tables, charts and graphs created by someone other than the author (unless only reproducing factual data)

Payment of any required fees is also the responsibility of the author. It is important that you obtain in writing all necessary permission to use material immediately, as we will not begin editing without it, and publication will likely be delayed. When requesting permission, be sure to ask for non-exclusive world rights for print and electronic editions as well as future revised editions of the book in the English language.

For personal photographs, you will need permission from the photographer. If individuals appear in the photograph who are not public figures, you will need their permission as well.

Copies of the fully executed permission documents should be included when you the final manuscript to us.

Any work published after 1923 should be presumed to be in copyright. Anything published prior to 1923 is in the public domain and can be used freely (without proper attribution). As of 1978, copyright remains in effect for the length of the author's life, plus 75 years. In most instances, you can assume that material copyrighted in countries outside of the United States will fall under the same rules as material copyrighted within the United States.

Fair Use

While it is often difficult to determine precisely what constitutes "fair use," we consider up to 10 percent of a prose work (composed of assorted brief extracts) and use of 50 percent of a poem to be "fair use."

STYLE

The following elements are required for all books:

• title page
• table of contents
• list of illustrations, if your manuscript contains illustrations
• captions, if your manuscript contains illustrations
• author biography

The following elements are not required, but you may want to include them:

• dedication
• epigraph
• acknowledgments
• preface
  

We ask that you make every effort to use bias-free and gender-neutral language. For style, capitalization, spelling and hyphenation, refer to The Chicago Manual of Style.

Tribute Books shall edit work. Author understands that editing includes correction of spelling, punctuation, and grammar; checking for consistency, proper usage and typographical errors. Author understands that editing includes content support and resolution, evaluation of flow, presentation and sentence structure. Tribute Books shall provide the Author with a set of typeset proofs of the Work prior to publication. Tribute Books will have the final say on all edits. The work will be professionally edited in order to compete with similar titles in the marketplace. The Work will conform to Tribute Books' style, the subject matter, and intended audience.

ARTWORK

All submitted artwork must be of the highest quality. All digital images must be at least 300 dpi resolution TIFF files. For non-digital prints, submit 8" x 10" or 5" x 7" prints that are bright, sharp and focused. Avoid submitting an image that is a printed piece, such as a magazine, newspaper or book, or a print-out of a digital image. Do not provide the image to us embedded in a word-processing program. Do not submit graphics pulled from the web. Web graphics aren't the same as graphics for print and are unusable in your book. They are low-quality JPG and GIF files with deteriorated detail and size. Your use also may be infringing on someone's copyright.

Illustrations which will appear in a gallery should be numbered consecutively. Those which appear within the text should be numbered consecutively within each chapter and should include the chapter number. For example, the first illustration (whether a photograph, figure or map) in chapter 1 would be labeled "Figure 1.1." Do not interweave the illustrations with the manuscript pages. Instead their placement in the text should be called out. This can be done by putting in brackets a note like "[Fig. 1.1]." We can't guarantee exact placement but will do our best to place them as close to the desired position as possible.

Tribute Books can connect an author with the services of an artist who is skilled and proficient in a variety of artistic styles and mediums. Artist will work with the author to create artwork to include with the work. Author will be responsible for any artists fees.

MARKETING

A marketing campaign for your book begins in advance of publication. We will use the information you provide to develop review lists, press releases, targeted emails, speaking engagements, book signings and interview opportunities.

For a book to do well, the author must be totally committed to promoting it. Tribute Books is interested in authors who want to actively market their work.

We are looking for authors who would devote the time and effort necessary to market their books. We would work on setting up author interviews with blogs and arrange book signings. We would email promotional opportunities on a continual basis that would require the author's response. Basically, if the author does not promote. The book does not sell. We would help you, but the author needs to follow our recommendations.

In terms of travel, authors have the final say if they want to do an event. Tribute Books would not confirm a booking until the author approved it. Tribute Books does try to keep events within the author's local area.

All contact between the Author and Tribute Books will be done via email or postal mail - no exceptions.

ROYALTIES

Royalties are calculated quarterly on January 1, April 1, July 1 and October 1. Statements are mailed to the address we have on file for you. Therefore, to ensure you receive your royalty statements and payments, please notify us if your address changes after you sign your contract. For each print copy sold through Tribute Books, the author will receive a 10% royalty payment on the retail price (for eBooks, 30% on the eBook retail price).

The retail price is based on a number of factors - number of pages, size of book, cost per copy to print, similar books in the genre, etc. We also have to figure in the discounts that will be taken by wholesalers and stores which range from 20%-55%.

ORDERING BOOKS

Authors can order copies for their own personal use. For orders of 10 copies of more, they will receive a 40% discount off of the retail price.

SERVICES PROVIDED

Tribute Books will proved the ISBN number/bar code, copyright registration, Library of Congress Publisher Cataloging in Publication, cover design, interior page layout, marketing coordination, registering the book with Amazon including Search Inside the Book and Amazon Author Blog, Ingram and Baker & Taylor distribution, video book trailer on YouTube and other video sharing sites, eBook distribution (including Amazon's Kindle), copies provided to top online reviewers and more.

Author maintains copyright of the manuscript. Tribute Books owns the ISBN, layout and cover design.

The author will have the opportunity to see the cover design and make suggestions, but the final cover will be the decision of Tribute Books. It will be professionally designed to compete in the marketplace.

FORMS

Please click on the following forms to submit with your manuscript.

• Author Information Form
  
  
• Contributor's Agreement Form
  
  
• Interview Release Form
  
  
• Permission Request Form